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Lorne Michaels become king of late night TV as Seth Meyers takes over from Jimmy Fallon

Saturday Night Live honcho Michaels behind both Late Night With Seth Meyers and The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon

Lorne Michaels, right, seen with actor Alec Baldwin, has become the godfather of late night TV with news that Seth Meyers will take over Late Night from Jimmy Fallon when Fallon moves into Jay Leno's job. (KENA BETANCUR / REUTERS FILE PHOTO)

It’s no surprise that when comedian Seth Meyers was named as the new host of Late Night on Mother’s Day, he thanked executive producer Lorne Michaels first. Then his mother.

While the attention was on Meyers, it is Toronto-raised Michaels who has emerged as the real winner.

The former University of Toronto English major has solidified his position as the kingmaker of late night, producing not just the upcoming Late Night With Seth Meyers and The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon, but Saturday Night Live for NBC.

Saturday Night Live has long been a kind of Juilliard School for comics and the 68-year-old Canadian has managed to pump out an astonishing profusion of talent. Shades of Louis B. Mayer: Michaels had turned the late night sketch show into a prolific feeder factory where megastars in waiting hone their skills while waiting to be signed up for movie or TV production deals.

After all, what better training ground than SNL’s “Weekend Update” to polish the skills of Fallon and Meyers for their own real life shows?

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Michaels’ footprints are all over late night TV and that includes former SNL writer and TBS talk show host Conan O’Brien, who credits Michaels with boosting his career.

Michaels’ ascendancy has been a long time coming. But the turn of events was likely helped by NBC’s unprecedented ratings decline.

During February sweeps month, the network that created “Must See TV” trailed not just CBS, Fox and ABC, but Spanish-language TV Univision for fifth place. Some weeks, Saturday Night Live was the only bright spot.

So it wasn’t surprising that NBC chair Bob Greenblatt would turn to Michaels to help shore up bleeding viewership.

“I will be stepping down to take over The Tonight Show and Jay Leno will be taking over my job,” Greenblatt quipped Monday to media in New York in a reference to the revolving door of late night TV.

The pressure on Michaels is already intense. When Fallon replaces Leno next spring, the Canadian will assume control of the show, helping to shape the discourse of American pop culture by going head to head with ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel and David Letterman at CBS in a battle for late night supremacy.

“That he’s doing The Tonight Show is pretty far out,” actor Alec Baldwin, who stars in 30 Rock, another Michaels production, told the New York Daily News. “Sure he (Michaels) has got all these legacy names on his resumé. But it just keeps on going . . . It all goes back to Lorne. All of it.”

To make things more manageable, Michaels is moving The Tonight Show to New York where Late Night With Seth Meyers will be also be broadcast from NBC headquarters at 30 Rockefeller Plaza.

It’s not as if he didn’t already have enough on his plate.

Michaels has been the man behind Saturday Night Live since it was created in 1975 (apart from a five-year absence in the 1980s). The show has been nominated for more than 150 Emmy Awards.

He’s been responsible for launching the careers of everyone from Jim Belushi, Mike Myers, Chevy Chase and Adam Sandler to Will Ferrell and Tina Fey. Using SNL alumni, he’s had a hand in movies such as Wayne’s World, Mean Girls and Anchorman, creating a billion-dollar box office movie franchise.

Canada, and Toronto in particular, has punched far above its weight when it comes to producing Hollywood comics. A 1985 HBO mockumentary The Canadian Conspiracy, which starred Michaels, was an early satire of how Canadians were subversively taking over Hollywood.

But the story starts largely in Toronto. There, Michaels spent many days at the College Playhouse, a theatre owned by his grandparents near the University of Toronto. He went to Forest Hill Collegiate Institute and after getting his English degree he worked as a writer for CBC Radio. In 1968, he moved to Los Angeles to work on Laugh-In and The Beautiful Phyllis Diller Show.

His Canadian comedy roots run deep: his former wife is Rosie Shuster, the daughter of Frank Shuster of Wayne and Shuster fame.

Michaels’ one true love remains SNL, which despite the high staff turnover rate has remained relatively fresh.

“I’ll do it as long as I possibly can,” he told moderator Martin Short at a luncheon for the Hollywood Radio and Television Society’s newsmaker series recently. “I think that there will be a day when I’ll look at it and say I don’t have the edge I used to.”

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